How to Unblock Websites at School

Unblocking Websites at School has become a regularly asked question and in this article I’m going to show you the easiest, safest and most reliable method to achieve it.

Schools, Colleges and Universities have changed drastically over the past 15 years. Computers and internet access are now part of mainstream education from the very youngest kids all the way up to those in higher and further education.

While technology and more importantly the internet features in everyday schooling at all levels the use of the internet as an extracurricular activity while in your school, college or university environment is commonplace.

Unfortunately, educational institutes are often regularly locked down allowing very limited internet access and depending what type of education establishment you attend you could find that all your favourite websites are blocked. Often discussion forums like Reddit, 4Chan and others are completely inaccessible and anything remotely racy or that could be considered illegal such as torrent sites is usually totally blocked.

Websites blocked in school.

How to Unblock Websites at School

No doubt you’ve attempted to find ways to bypass these blocks, but unfortunately they’re often hard coded into school firewalls. The first port of call is usually to look for a web proxy but because of their popularity it is relatively easy for your school or campus to block them.

The best method to unblock websites at school is to use a VPN. If you haven’t heard of the term VPN it stands for Virtual Private Network. Originally they were used by big businesses to allow users to work remotely. They work by creating an encrypted tunnel to a third party server or location allowing remote users to work safely and securely.

One of the benefits of a VPN is your internet connection is then fully tunnelled via the VPN provider meaning you essentially access the internet from their servers. The result of this is you can access an open and unrestricted internet.

So if a site is blocked on your local school network you’ll be able to access it and the best thing is your school can’t block you from accessing that website because the VPN connection is encrypted to military grade and because of that they won’t know what sites you’re visiting.

VPN services are available for Windows PC, Mac and also for tablets and phones that run Android or iOS. So if you can install programs on your school’s desktop or laptop computers or you can connect to their Wi-Fi network via your own computer, tablet or phone then a VPN will be the ideal solution.

What’s the best VPN for school

There are hundreds of VPN providers to choose from and most cost US$5 or $10 per month which is around £3 – £6. VPN providers offer servers worldwide and for accessing general sites you want to make sure you pick one that has servers in your country as this will give you the best speeds. If you’re downloading files then you may want to consider using a server outside your country, with VPN providers you can swap and change between countries.

All three accept usual payment methods like Paypal, Credit Card etc, but if you don’t have access to any standard payment systems you can use a gift card to pay at the provider PrivateInternetAccess.

I personally use IPVanish but feel free to take a look at all three providers to see which you like the best. Once you’ve visited their site simply sign up.

Once you’ve signed up you can then download their software or apps for your device.

Once installed select a server local to yourself and connect. You’ll now be able to unblock websites at school that were previously blocked.

Using both the desktop software and mobile apps are self-explanatory. As you can see in the example from IPVanish it’s simply a case of pressing Server Selection and then selecting a server from the map or list.

IPVanish VPN easily accessible via software.

I’d love to hear your comments or if you get stuck please post in the comments section as I’d be glad to help.

Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.netImage courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net

About The Author

Christopher has been using the internet since 1994 and has a keen interest in privacy & security with a particular passion for encouraging VPN use. When not delving into the online world he enjoys globe trotting, breaking a sweat in the gym and photography.